At a senior living community in Austin, Texas, dozens of former classmates are proving that friendships built in childhood can last a lifetime.
More than 50 graduates of Austin High School now live at Westminster, which offers independent living, assisted living, memory support, skilled nursing and rehabilitation services on one campus, according to its website.
Decades after graduation, many have found themselves neighbors once again.
Some have known each other since elementary school, while others reconnected years later after moving into the community.
For Russ Butler, 89, and Carlene Jenkins, 89, the friendship dates back roughly 80 years.
“We’re back with old friends,” Butler told ABC News. “They’re not really strangers.”
Many of the residents gather every Tuesday evening as part of a group they call “ROOL,” short for “Rest of Our Lives.”
They meet for dinner, games and social activities, while also organizing an annual Austin High School reunion that has become one of Westminster’s most beloved traditions.
The idea for the reunion came from resident Cynthia Leach, 77, who graduated from Austin High School in 1966.
“From our class point, we started with 10-year reunions,” Leach said. “Here at Westminster, I came up with the idea overnight one time, and we have annual reunions here in March of each year [and] we just had our fourth reunion.”
The friendships were forged in a very different Austin than the booming city known today.
“Austin was very small kind of when we were in high school,” Butler recalled.
Many of the graduates grew up in the same neighborhoods, attended the same school and remained connected through the years. Others lost touch while raising families and building careers before reconnecting later in life.